U.S. durable goods orders dropped 2.1% last month amid a slowdown in exports and a buildup in inventories. This is the latest economic data set showing cracks in the economy while the world's largest economies engage in a trade war. IHS Markit said Thursday that U.S. manufacturing activity fell to a nine-year low.

...

"The growing worries around a US/China elongated trade battle and its implications on the tech space are heavily weighing on the minds of both investors and the companies themselves caught in the cross hairs," Dan Ives, analyst at Wedbush Securities, wrote in a note to clients. "The ‘poster child' for the US/China trade wars continue to be Apple with the stock under heavy pressure as many competitors are yelling fire in a crowded theater around the potential China impact to Cupertino if this situation worsens.

]]>iehi-feed-64738Fri, 24 May 2019 17:04:52 GMTThe Economy is Stagnant, Not "Booming"http://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-24_TheEconomyisStagnantNotBooming.html
President Trump likes to brag about the supposedly booming economy. So do other Republican politicians. Some journalists have gotten into the habit too, exaggerating the strength of the economic expansion, because it makes for a good story. Here's the truth: There is no boom. The economy has been mired in an extended funk since the financial crisis ended in 2010. G.D.P. growth still has not reached 3 percent in any year, and 3 percent isn't a very high bar.

Last week, while attending an economics conference in Washington, I discovered one particularly clear sign of the economy's struggles -- namely, that it keeps performing worse than the experts have predicted.

...

Over time, the differences between the experts' predictions and the economy's performance have added up. The American economy would be about 6 percent larger today -- producing $1.3 trillion more in goods and services this year -- if the forecasts had come true. And for most families, real-life experience has been more disappointing than the G.D.P. numbers, because much of the bounty of the economy's growth has flowed to the affluent.

...

The 2017 Trump tax [was] is a dreadful piece of economic policy -- essentially a giant effort to aggravate income inequality. Tax cuts that benefit the wealthy most are huge and permanent. Tax cuts focused on everyone else are smaller and temporary... A better policy response would start with a tax cut focused on the majority of Americans, not the wealthy. And there are many other ways to take on secular stagnation... Infrastructure projects, to jump-start investment. The retirement of coal-fired power plants, which would also lead to new investment. Stronger safety-net programs, including Social Security, to reduce the savings glut. More aggressive antitrust policies, to combat monopolies. And a Federal Reserve that, at long last, stopped making the same mistake -- of overestimating both growth and inflation.

]]>iehi-feed-64735Fri, 24 May 2019 13:45:54 GMTTheresa May Meets Her Lonely Endhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-24_TheresaMayMeetsHerLonelyEnd.html
Mrs. May, as the first prime minister after the 2016 Brexit referendum, could have minimized those difficulties by exposing that lie, and by seeking a Brexit that kept Britain's economy close to Europe's while honoring the decision to leave. She had the power to define what Brexit meant. From the start she could have sought a consensus across Parliament.

Tragically she chose instead to pander to the her party's right wing and its backers in the news media, promising to quit both the European Union's single market and its customs union, and ceaselessly repeating the disastrous idea that "no deal is better than a bad deal." Her decisions in those first months were calamitous; they framed Brexit as a sharp break from Europe and turned it from a problem to a disaster.

]]>iehi-feed-64734Fri, 24 May 2019 12:31:37 GMTFederal Savings Bank CEO Indicted For Approving Manafort Mortgageshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-24_FederalSavingsBankCEOIndictedForApprovingManafortMortgages.html
iehi-feed-64733Fri, 24 May 2019 03:00:08 GMTTrump Gives Farmers $16 Billion in Aid Amid Prolonged China Trade War; Fails To Quell Their Anxietieshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-23_TrumpGivesFarmers16BillioninAidAmidProlongedChinaTradeWarFailsTo.html
Jim Costa, a congressman from California who heads the House agriculture subcommittee, criticized the plan as a "rushed and poorly-planned bailout" that might end up giving less aid to some farmers, like those who grow fruit and vegetable crops in central California.

"For more than a year now, producers of every commodity have said the same thing: they want long-term access to export markets, not hasty attempts by the federal government to clean up its own mess," Mr. Costa said. "I urge the White House to rescind the tariffs and sit down in a constructive manner with the Chinese to address issues that will actually improve the market for our farmers."

...

The collateral damage to farmers from the trade clash with China now looms as a potential obstacle to the president's re-election. China's tariffs against products like soybeans and beef and a recent move to cancel a major pork order have hit swing states, including Iowa, Ohio and Wisconsin, especially hard.

A survey of 400 American farmers by Purdue University and the CME Group, a global markets company, showed that sentiment plunged in April, stemming from concerns about worsening tensions with China. Only 28 percent of farmers surveyed said that they believed a soybean dispute with China would be resolved by July 1, down from 45 percent in March, while 74 percent of those surveyed said now was a "bad time" to make big farm investments.

]]>iehi-feed-64732Thu, 23 May 2019 22:23:51 GMTNew York Passes Bill Giving Congress a Way to Get Trump's State Tax Returnshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-23_NewYorkPassesBillGivingCongressaWaytoGetTrumpsStateTaxReturns.html
New York State lawmakers on Wednesday gave their final approval to a bill that would clear a path for Congress to obtain President Trump's state tax returns, injecting another element into a tortuous battle over the president's refusal to release his taxes.

The bill, which is expected to be signed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a third-term Democrat and regular critic of Mr. Trump's policies and behavior, will authorize state tax officials to release the president's state returns to any one of three congressional committees.

The returns -- filed in New York, the president's home state and business headquarters -- would likely contain much of the same information as the contested federal returns, though it remained unclear whether those congressional committees would use such new power in their investigations.

The Legislature's actions put the state in a bit of uncharted legal territory; Mr. Trump has said that he is ready to take the fight over his federal tax returns to the Supreme Court, and it seems likely that he would seek to contest New York's maneuver.

...

Steven M. Rosenthal, a tax lawyer and senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, said he would not be surprised if the president fought the state law, though he believed it passed legal muster.

"Of course, the Legislature was motivated by Donald Trump's current refusals," Mr. Rosenthal said, but added that he thought the bill was written broadly enough to avoid the "bill of attainder" accusation.

That opinion was echoed by Brian Galle, a law professor at Georgetown University Law School, who said that "bills of attainder have been interpreted really narrowly by the courts," and noted that legislation often describes targeted industries or municipalities in vague terms.

]]>iehi-feed-64731Thu, 23 May 2019 22:18:40 GMTLiving In A Van in Google's Backyard? Strapped Tech Co. Employees About To Be Hit With Banhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-23_LivingInAVaninGooglesBackyardStrappedTechCoEmployeesAboutToBeHit.html
Some Silicon Valley towns have cracked down in recent months, creating an even more uncertain future for RV residents. At a March city council meeting, Mountain View voted to ban RVs from parking overnight on public streets. The ban hasn't taken effect yet, but soon, the town's van dwellers will need to go elsewhere. The city council also declared a shelter crisis and passed a new ordinance to ticket vehicles that "discharge domestic sewage on the public right of way." At the meeting, some people opposing the ban blamed Google for the housing crisis.

...

She applied online to be a Google security guard and when the contracting firm gave her the job, she moved to Mountain View in April. She initially considered renting a small apartment, but realized she couldn't save any money that way. "An apartment out here would cost at least $2,500 a month," she said. "The money I make here is great, but I would be pretty much spending the majority of that on rent and I just don't want to do that." So she decided to rent the RV for $800 a month.

"There's less space. That's the main thing. It's confined," she said. Her day starts on Google's campus where she can grab a quick breakfast, usually a banana. Lunch is also available at headquarters, while dinner is prepared on the RVs two stove tops. There's no oven.

...

Another RV resident in Mountain View is a 41-year-old IT professional who now drives for Lyft Inc. He moved from Sacramento about two years ago after his wife got a job at a big drug-development company in Silicon Valley. (He asked not to be identified because he worries his wife might lose her job if her employer learns about her living situation.) Once they arrived, they realized they couldn't afford to rent an apartment and build their savings, despite a combined income of roughly $100,000 a year.

"We just did the math when we were, you know, renting a room, and we could kind of stay afloat but there's no way to save any money for retirement or the future at all," he said.

...

The Lyft driver, and other van dwellers around him, said they aren't sure what they'll do when the parking ban kicks in, rendering their situation illegal. Many hope to just muddle through somehow. "I'm aware of the ban," said Brandon, another Mountain View RV resident who didn't want to share his last name. "I'll cross that particular bridge when I get to it."

Tech companies should be doing more to fix the housing crisis, the Lyft driver said. "There was a time when corporations were allowed to operate because they were also providing for the communities around them in some way," he said. "And for some reason that responsibility has shifted to profits only."

]]>iehi-feed-64729Wed, 22 May 2019 15:05:56 GMTSandals Resorts Allegedly Ripped Off Guests With Bogus Taxes Chargeshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-22_SandalsResortsAllegedlyRippedOffGuestsWithBogusTaxesCharges.html
iehi-feed-64728Wed, 22 May 2019 13:30:00 GMTHome sales unexpectedly fell in April despite a big drop in mortgage rateshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-22_HomesalesunexpectedlyfellinAprildespiteabigdropinmortgagerates.html
iehi-feed-64726Mon, 20 May 2019 18:07:44 GMTDitech Customers Win Major Victory In Ditech Bankruptcyhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-20_DitechCustomersWinMajorVictoryInDitechBankruptcy.html
iehi-feed-64723Sun, 19 May 2019 17:16:51 GMTDe Blasio admin. moves to strip equity from hundreds of homes in black and Hispanic neighborhoods in "third-party transfer" foreclosureshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-19_DeBlasioadminmovestostripequityfromhundredsofhomesinblackandHisp.html
In the Council districts that include Williamsburg, Bushwick, Brownsville and East New York, the city has initiated third-party proceedings on at least 107 homes and foreclosed on 20. In three South Bronx districts, 83 third-party proceedings have been launched since 2015, records show. Of those, 18 properties have changed hands.

The city has foreclosed on 62 properties citywide through the program overall since 2015, officials said. Critics from homeowners to elected officials and lawyer-advocates claim the city has failed to notify property owners who are losing long-term investments.

"A lot of these homeowners had no idea these properties were being taken out from under them," said Scott Kohanowski, an attorney and the director of the Homeowner Stability Project. "And the city takes all that equity. That's the most appalling part."

...

City officials contend they notify both landlords and tenants through mailed notices, robocalls, flyers and forums. But some say tenants don't find out about what's happening until it's too late.

A lawyer for tenants at a foreclosure in the Bronx, Serge Joseph, said their co-op board did not receive notice.

...

"[The city] told people there would be no more shareholding, but they didn't explain anything. They didn't say why," Jones said. "This whole group is just taking away people's housing. That's their purpose."

The transactions, some of which involved Mr. Trump's now-defunct foundation, set off alerts in a computer system designed to detect illicit activity, according to five current and former bank employees. Compliance staff members who then reviewed the transactions prepared so-called suspicious activity reports that they believed should be sent to a unit of the Treasury Department that polices financial crimes.

But executives at Deutsche Bank, which has lent billions of dollars to the Trump and Kushner companies, rejected their employees' advice. The reports were never filed with the government.

...

Ms. McFadden [a longtime anti-money laundering specialist in Deutsche Bank's Jacksonville office] said she was terminated last year after she raised concerns about the bank's practices. Since then, she has filed complaints with the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulators about the bank's anti-money-laundering enforcement.

...

Ms. McFadden said she had reviewed the transactions and found that money had moved from Kushner Companies to Russian individuals. She concluded that the transactions should be reported to the government -- in part because federal regulators had ordered Deutsche Bank, which had been caught laundering billions of dollars for Russians, to toughen its scrutiny of potentially illegal transactions.

... Typically, such a report would be reviewed by a team of anti-money laundering experts who are independent of the business line in which the transactions originated -- in this case, the private-banking division -- according to Ms. McFadden and two former Deutsche Bank managers.

That did not happen with this report. It went to managers in New York who were part of the private bank, which caters to the ultrawealthy. They felt Ms. McFadden's concerns were unfounded and opted not to submit the report to the government, the employees said.

Ms. McFadden and some of her colleagues said they believed the report had been killed to maintain the private-banking division's strong relationship with Mr. Kushner.

After Mr. Trump became president, transactions involving him and his companies were reviewed by an anti-financial crime team at the bank called the Special Investigations Unit. That team, based in Jacksonville, produced multiple suspicious activity reports involving different entities that Mr. Trump owned or controlled, according to three former Deutsche Bank employees who saw the reports in an internal computer system.

Some of those reports involved Mr. Trump's limited liability companies. At least one was related to transactions involving the Donald J. Trump Foundation, two employees said.

Deutsche Bank ultimately chose not to file those suspicious activity reports with the Treasury Department, either, according to three former employees. They said it was unusual for the bank to reject a series of reports involving the same high-profile client.

]]>iehi-feed-64721Sun, 19 May 2019 16:59:20 GMTThe suburban lifestyle: coming to a city near you (FOR $2M+ OF COURSE)http://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-19_ThesuburbanlifestylecomingtoacitynearyouFOR2MOFCOURSE.html
the idea of a city itself is changing. In some ways, living in a dense urban area has become much more pleasant for certain types of people -- namely the affluent and those who prize proximity to the action above all else. You can now live within easy walking distance of your favorite restaurants, go see a play and shop at Target nearby. But what does it mean when urban living becomes a luxury good and a lifestyle brand?

...

At the Dahlia, a 38-unit building under construction on Manhattan's Upper West Side, developers say the idea is to set up condos large enough that they could reasonably replicate the feeling of a house in suburbia. The building has no studios or one-bedrooms. The largest units, with four bedrooms, are around 2,100 square feet with prices starting just over $4 million.

One of the Dahlia's biggest selling points? It has its own parking garage. "You can pull in with your S.U.V., unload and take your things in a private manner," said Shlomi Reuveni, the president of the company that is handling sales for the building. "That's very appealing." And very suburban.

In some high-end buildings, architects are giving apartments the feel of single-family homes by replicating the layouts of suburban houses. At the Quay Tower, which overlooks Brooklyn Bridge Park, there are just five condos on each floor, two of which have private elevator access. Inside, the larger units have something you see a lot of on HGTV suburban house renovation shows: large mudrooms off the back door with locker-like cubbies and sturdy ceramic-tile floors.

In Seattle, there's a new luxury apartment building with a rooftop lounge with hammocks and a chicken coop you might see in a more permissive (or at least chicken-friendly) suburb. In New York, the developer Extell is wrapping up construction on the Kent, a building on the Upper East Side that has, in addition to a stroller valet and a swimming pool where kids can take lessons, an area called "Camp Kent." It's a play space that looks like a woodsy country scene with a treehouse and a carpeted "river" leading to a private outdoor playground.

]]>iehi-feed-64720Sat, 18 May 2019 18:25:16 GMTDeed Fraud Alert: Woman Evicted From Home She Thought She Ownedhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-18_DeedFraudAlertWomanEvictedFromHomeSheThoughtSheOwned.html
iehi-feed-64719Fri, 17 May 2019 18:38:48 GMTTrump in His Own Private Slump (EXCEPT FOR EMOLUMENTS!!)http://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-17_TrumpinHisOwnPrivateSlumpEXCEPTFOREMOLUMENTS.html
President Trump's family business saw its overall revenues decline modestly in 2018, according to his annual financial report released Thursday, suggesting a disconnect between the Trump brand and the still-growing national economy.

The revenue declines were most pronounced at some of Mr. Trump's best-known properties, including the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, which experienced a nearly 10 percent drop. Hotels in Chicago and Hawaii, as well as golf courses in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and the Bronx, also saw declines, suggesting that sales are being affected by consumers deciding to turn away from the Trump brand, industry analysts said.

The results were somewhat better for the Trump International Hotel in Washington, which has become a favored spot for Republicans, lobbyists and some foreign governments and accounts for nearly 10 percent of the Trump Organization's revenues.

...

That retrenchment appears driven mostly by political factors, given that the economy has been relatively strong for the past several years. Mr. Trump's polarizing policies and increasingly intense clashes with Democrats have turned off some potential customers and clients, particularly in heavily Democratic cities like Chicago.''

]]>iehi-feed-64718Thu, 16 May 2019 13:59:11 GMTStudent Loan Debt Alert: Feds Crank Up Collection Effortshttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-16_StudentLoanDebtAlertFedsCrankUpCollectionEfforts.html
iehi-feed-64717Wed, 15 May 2019 23:44:39 GMTThe Real Motivation for FacebookCoinhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-15_TheRealMotivationforFacebookCoin.html
what better way to pacify government bureaucrats than to "share" profits with users... And the easiest way for Facebook to do that is with its own currency.

That's what FacebookCoin is all about... Simply put, Facebook is trying to save its own skin... by getting VC firms involved with FacebookCoin, it will claim that the project is decentralized and not solely controlled by Facebook. It's just a clever front to deflect scrutiny.

...

Facebook has been lobbying for additional government regulations on social media. That way, Facebook doesn't have to self-police -- it can simply follow orders. That also allows it to deflect public backlash.

If that doesn't work, Facebook has [its FacebookCoin play]...

]]>iehi-feed-64716Wed, 15 May 2019 16:17:01 GMTAmateur Home Flippers Get Harsh Wake Up Callhttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-15_AmateurHomeFlippersGetHarshWakeUpCall.html
iehi-feed-64715Tue, 14 May 2019 14:14:16 GMTAngelo Mozilo Says He Is Done Being The Villain Of The Financial Crisishttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-14_AngeloMoziloSaysHeIsDoneBeingTheVillainOfTheFinancialCrisis.html
iehi-feed-64713Mon, 13 May 2019 12:15:19 GMTNew York City Taxes Create A Conga Line Of Businesses To Miamihttp://implode-explode.com/viewnews/2019-05-13_NewYorkCityTaxesCreateACongaLineOfBusinessesToMiami.html